Abstract:

The poems of Hoca Ahmed Yesevî (Khoja Akhmet Yassawi) are called “hiqmet”, written in stanza form and syllabic meter with a languge that the people can understand. Yesevî aims at teaching the people manners of order, religous-sufic subjects with his hikmets. Teaching some important subjects in simple poetic form with meter and rhyme is a method that has been tried by many writers and intellectuals, which has given positive/useful results in different periods of history. The success of the method lies in the easy memorization of measured and rhymed statements that sticks in the mind. The Quran whose verses end with sounds that can be regarded as prose rhyme is the best example affirming this opinion. Written in fourteenth century, Mu‘înu’l-Murîd by Sheikh İslam is also a poetic work aiming to teach the people the rules of Islam and pillars of faith in stanzaic form. We also see the background thoughts of Yesevî’s hiqmets in early twentieth century author Ziya Gökalp’s prose and poetry. Gökalp thinks that national epics, Turkish folk tales and legends, religio-mythical and historical topics can be taught easily with metrical and ryhmed sayings. These humanistic and moral thoughts taught in poetic form led to describing him as a sheikh coming from Khorasan or Uzbekistan. Yesevî deals with different religious-sufic topics in his hiqmets in Dîvân. It can be said that the main topics of his hiqmets are sharia rules, the sunna of Prophet Muhammad, love of the prophet, the manners of Yesevî order, traditions-customs and conventions, love and signs, difficulties of love etc. Among these, love is the reason for the change in Ahmed-i Yesevî’s life. Reaching beloved and eternal happiness is only possible through love.

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